2 comments:

Candy
said...

In fact he was absolutely miserable. The farewell party had been planned since he first announced his leaving but all they had done all night was harangue him for deserting his poor old mum, leaving his employer in the lurch just as Christmas loomed, giving up a promising career, all for that hell hole, that pocket of sin, that devourer of young men, which was London. "I've got to get out of here," he thought. "One minute more of this bunch and I'll go bonkers and kill the lot of them." He was planning his escape when the door opened, letting in a vision of such loveliness that for a moment he couldn't breathe. The young woman's eyes caught his and their green depths sucked him down as into a whirlpool. The room grew silent as everyone watched her advance toward him. "Who are you?" she said in a voice like a rusty spring, grating and ugly. Where was her beauty now? Thank God, thought Richard as he flew out of the door,gulping in the frosty, clean night air, as he headed toward freedom and the early train to Paddington.

The night before he went to London, Richard Mayhew was not enjoying himself...

But, really, can you blame him? Attending a bachelor party with a bunch of computer geeks at a Denny's in Beaver Dam, Kentucky, wasn't exactly his idea of a good time. As Brian ordered yet another Moons Over My Hammy, his only consolation was the thought of his impending trip to England - and the hope that he could leave his geekdom behind forever.